


I Can Hear Them

by Eldabe



Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-12
Updated: 2011-04-12
Packaged: 2017-10-17 23:55:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 850
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/182713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eldabe/pseuds/Eldabe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for a request on the Star Trek XI Kink Meme: "Post movie, Kirk starts having nightmares. The only time he sleeps through the night? When he crawls into bed with Bones."</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Can Hear Them

**Author's Note:**

> _I Can Hear Them_ was originally posted on my livejournal [here](http://eldarwannabe.livejournal.com/90952.html).

They had finally landed on the moon yesterday, and most of the crew had been shuttled down to San Francisco for debriefing this morning. They had all smiled for the cameras, and been assigned debriefings times, counseling times, and various other duties. Classes were going to start again in a few weeks so they could complete the year and receive their official stations.

Jim had eaten dinner with Sulu and Chekov in a depressingly empty cafeteria. Now that they were back, it was horrible how obvious their losses truly were. Sulu had quietly informed them that his roommate had been assigned the _Farragut_. Chekov told them how one of the first-year cadets started crying when he walked past her in the hallway. Jim silently wondered how Bones was doing moving his last critical patients to the best facilities on the moon.

He was supposed to take the shuttle in three days. God, Bones was going to hate taking it by himself.

Jim tried to keep his mind on that as he rolled over and stared at Bones' empty bed. Tried to think about the fresh vegetables at dinner, and how Bones was going to grumble as he took the latest of his space-transport vehicles back to Earth.

Tried not to think about the billions - a _planetfull_ \- of screaming voices that had woken him with a start not ten minutes ago. Tried to ignore the glowing clock readout of 04:25 from across the room. Tried not to remember how the silence of space came alive with it's own soundtrack of fear and terror as he dreamed about those first few ships coming out of warp for a threat so totally beyond their technological resources as to be almost funny.

~*~

"Damn fool shuttle. Shook the whole way down." Bones said, dropping his medkit on the bed, and cracking his back.

"But you made it!" Jim said, forcing a smile. Bones looked at him critically for a moment.

"You look like shit." Bones observed.

Jim cracked a brief grin. "Thanks, Bones." He watched Bones throw his medical blues into the laundry basket and drop some PADD disks onto his desk.

"Place is damn depressing." Bones muttered, and Jim shifted uncomfortably.

"Classes start again in two weeks," Jim offered.

Bones grunted. "I'm going to take a shower. Want to go for dinner afterwards?"

"Sure," Jim said, and stared at the ceiling while Bones peeled off his shirt and grabbed a towel.

~*~

 _"Go back!" Jim screamed. "Don't come out of warp!"_

 _But they didn't go back. They didn't they didn't and they stopped and that horrible ship (it looks like a squid. A giant monstrous squid. The time that snatch fish out of the sea with the same sudden swiftness as it uses to shoot) decimates the ships._

 _But it's not ships, it's_ people _and Jim sees them pouring out of the wreckages like cereal, but their eyes were popping out and they couldn't breathe they couldn't breathe the planet was_ exploding _, people dying too fast to even fall into space, shattered into pieces of nothingness and they screamed together logic lost in the darkness -_

"Jim, wake up! Wake up, Jim!"

And Jim jerked into wakefulness with the same sudden panic of every night since he's been on the ground. Then he grabbed Bones' arm. His throat felt raw and painful.

"I can hear them, Bones," he gasped, "while they're dying. I can hear them screaming."

Bones paused. "That's not possible, Jim. It's just a dream." He patted Jim's shoulder awkwardly.

Jim closed his eyes and took a shaky breath. "I know, I know."

They sat there for a few moments, then Bones got up. The numbers 02:17 glowed over his shoulder. Damn, it was getting earlier.

"I'm fine, Bones." he mumbled, then lay back down. Bones hesitated, then got back into his own bed. The lights dimmed automatically.

"I'm not sleeping." Jim blurted into the darkness. "I haven't slept a full night in weeks and since we got back I haven't been able to go back to sleep after the nightmares." He rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands.

Silence. Then, "Jim, you've had barely two hours of sleep."

"I know."

They lay there for an endless amount of time, the bizarre quietness of the campus engulfing them both.

"You're not asleep yet, are you?" Bones asked, the hint of worry sneaking into his voice.

Jim stared at the ceiling. "No."

"Dammit." Jim heard Bones shifting over in his bed. "Get over here."

"What?"

"You're having nightmares, you need to sleep. I need to sleep. Get over here."

Feeling slightly ridiculous, and oddly like a four-year old, Jim swung his legs over his bed and shuffled the few feet over to Bones. He crawled into the bed, and Bones threw the blanket over him. It barely covered them both.

Jim twisted onto his side, pressing his back against Bones' to fit them both on the bed. The heat seeping through made him feel somewhat better.

 _You didn't get everyone, Nero._

"Bones?"

"Mmm?"

"Thanks."

"...Go to sleep, Jim."

And he did.


End file.
